NOVEL WEB Chapter 366: A Strange Owl
Han Yu crouched.
"Well?" he asked.
"Saw it!" Chitterfang whispered, his high-pitched voice excited but cautious. "Big bird. A white owl. Just sitting there. Staring."
"A white owl?" Han Yu echoed. "That's it?"
Chitterfang nodded vigorously. "White. Very white. Feathers glowed like moonlight. Its eyes were black—completely black, no whites at all. And it had these weird horns. Spiral-shaped. Like they twisted backward from its brow."
Han Yu's brows furrowed. "Spiral horns on an owl?"
That wasn't a common trait. Not among avians, not even among spirit beasts. He mentally flipped through the bestiary lists he'd studied—no match came to mind. Owls were often seen as omens or messengers in folklore, but this one didn't match any known species.
"Did it seem dangerous?" Han Yu asked.
Chitterfang shook his head immediately. "Nope. Didn't move. Didn't puff its feathers. Didn't even blink. Just looked straight toward the camp. Right at me. I was, uh, a little concerned, you know, on account of the whole 'owls-eat-rats' situation. But it didn't even twitch."
That was even stranger.
Han Yu sat back on his heels, eyes drifting back toward the dark forest.
An owl, that didn't blink. Pure white with black eyes and spiral horns. Just sitting there, observing the camp like some silent judge.
'What was it?'
A manifestation of the forest's spiritual energy?
A beast from some forgotten bloodline?
A spirit?
Or—was it the source of the hallucinations?
That thought clung to his mind like mist. It made too much sense.
While the hallucinations had no clear source, they'd all been powerful mind-based phenomena. That required something—or someone—to project that level of influence across such a wide area. An owl spirit beast with unknown abilities fit the profile far better than a simple cursed land.
And yet… it hadn't harmed anyone.
Was it testing them?
Watching?
Han Yu's instincts tugged at him again, not with a warning this time, but a question.
Should he approach it?
He didn't act on it yet. Not tonight. Not without knowing more. He couldn't risk jeopardizing the safety of the disciples under the forest's influence.
Still, he didn't dismiss it either.
He turned back to Chitterfang. "Keep watch on that direction. If it moves, tell me immediately."
Chitterfang gave a confident salute. "Aye-aye, boss."
As the rat scurried up a small tree to nestle in its branches for surveillance, Han Yu remained crouched at the edge of the array, eyes fixed on the shadows beyond.
The owl was still out there.
And somehow, he knew—
This wasn't the last time they'd cross paths.
The march resumed at dawn.
The White Marble Lady Forest, with its tall pale trees and gently swaying mist, should have been a place of tranquil beauty.
Yet, as the thousand-strong procession of disciples moved deeper beneath its canopy, the silence pressed in on them like a damp, weighted blanket. Footsteps crunched quietly along the forest floor, but no birdsong met their ears, no breeze stirred the leaves.
Barely twelve hours had passed since they broke camp that morning, but already a strange fatigue had begun to settle over most of the group. Shoulders sagged, eyes drooped, and movements slowed. Even those known for their endurance began to stumble slightly, their faces pale and drawn.
"I feel like I've been walking for days…" muttered one disciple from the Outer Court, his voice hushed as if afraid to disturb the forest.
Another leaned on her staff, sweat trailing down her brow. "Why does my qi feel… sluggish?"
Fatty Kui had uncharacteristically stopped humming and was now trudging in silence, sweat matting his clothes to his round frame. Wu Shuan wasn't much better, his gaze distant, as though wrestling with some invisible weight pressing against his thoughts.
The sense of weariness wasn't just physical—it was existential. A creeping dread, subtle yet insistent, wrapped itself around their minds. The deeper they went, the heavier the world seemed to grow.
Eventually, one of the inner court elders gave the order to halt. Soon after, the rest of the formation came to a slow, almost reluctant stop. By the time the sun had begun its descent behind the trees, it was clear they wouldn't be moving any farther today.
The elders gathered briefly to discuss the situation, their expressions unusually grave.
"This isn't normal," one said. "They marched four days straight before with only minimal rest. Now they can't even make it past noon?"
"There's no physical ailment I can detect. No injuries. No poison in the air," another replied, shaking his head. "But their qi circulation is dulled. As if something is blanketing the land."
"Could it be a formation?" an inner court instructor asked. "A spirit array left over from the past?"
"Perhaps. Or some strange beast's domain. Either way, this place is growing stranger."
"Has the Beast Peak Head sensed something?"
"No message from him yet."
"Looks like we're on our own for now."
With no better explanation and no safe path forward through the forest, the elders reluctantly called for another camp to be established, this time beside a gnarled grove of white-leafed trees. Protective arrays were erected again, multiple layers thick, while talismans and wards were hung at every major point around the perimeter.
Night fell quickly.
The forest became suffused with a pale blue luminescence, cast from glowing moss and the leaves themselves, giving the trees a ghostly radiance.
And then—the hallucinations began once more.
Voices whispered at the edge of perception.
Ghostly silhouettes appeared and vanished between the trees.
Some disciples heard old friends calling to them. Others saw long-dead relatives. Many simply dreamed while awake, their minds fraying at the edges as they tried to stay grounded.
A few outer court disciples screamed in the middle of the night, only to be comforted by their peers and calmed by the elders.
But again—no one was harmed.
The illusions, while disturbing, remained harmless. At least, for now.
Most of the elders endured it stoically. They heard the occasional disembodied voice or saw flickers of ghostly forms, but their minds were tempered by decades or centuries of cultivation. Their spiritual fortitude rendered the hallucinations little more than distractions.